In an earlier post I explained the rules of the game Telephone Pictionary. After spending some time staring at the segments from one of the games that I posted on my refrigerator door, I realized that, in Telephone Pictionary, meanings tend to skew towards ideas that are easily conveyed with well-recognized images.
In one segment, the semi-nonsensical phrase “DANKY HOLIDAY QUESADILLA” turned into the phrase “Phantom Pizza Christmas” because the Christmas tree was used as an image after the first turn and it survived a couple translations. A Christmas tree is a potent symbol.
When successful translation occurs, it points to the fact that the players are part of a shared visual culture.
In another segment, the ad slogan “Great Cheese Comes from Happy Cows, Happy Cows Come from California” is translated successfully from word to image, back to word, because all of the players were familiar with that TV ad campaign from a few years ago.
Somewhat unsettling is the fact that even if we want to think of ourselves as media-savvy and less susceptible to mass marketing strategies, we still communicated with each other successfully BASED ON our shared knowledge and memory of that ad campaign. It got to us!
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